


Fear of Falling (For You)

by flitterflutterfly



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: And love, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Implied past torture, M/M, The Meaning of Fear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-17
Updated: 2012-11-17
Packaged: 2017-11-18 20:44:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/565088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flitterflutterfly/pseuds/flitterflutterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is not a novel concept to Q, fear. But, he thinks, perhaps he doesn’t understand it half as well as Bond.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fear of Falling (For You)

**Author's Note:**

> Major spoilers for Skyfall and quite a lot of references to Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace.
> 
> The lovely Icarus translated this into Italian—which is awesome and fantastic. You can read that translation at http://www.efpfanfic.net/viewstory.php?sid=1435020.

“It’s a reminder,” Bond says.

“Of what?” Q asks, though he feels he shouldn’t. Though he feels that perhaps it is something too private.

Still, he asked, and he can’t now take it back. His words, once spoken aloud, become almost law at MI6. If he was to change just one, he would undermine them all. It is a delicate thing to hold, that truth.

Bond looks at him, for a moment assessing. No, that isn’t quite right. Bond is always assessing, even when he doesn’t look it, but when he does that means he wants the one he’s assessing to know he is. Q looks back blankly.

“I wonder…” Bond murmurs, but then he shakes his head. “I’ve always hated this bloody thing,” he says instead. "And she knew why."

And then, Q thinks he might get it. A question to ponder another day.

00Q00

It is easy, this relationship of sorts that he and Bond have developed. It is easy because they’ve never talked about it. Q fears talking about it, fears that he might force Bond to face those things he might not want to. Fears him leaving.

It is not a novel concept to Q, fear. But, he thinks, perhaps he doesn’t understand it half as well as Bond. Bond fears everything, because everything is a potential enemy. It is a thing of honor to not be feared by Bond, though Q doubts few see it so.

The ugly bulldog is one such thing that Bond once feared but no longer does. Q hates it for that fact and then hates himself for hating it. He hates that he couldn’t resist asking Bond about it, hates that Bond answered, hates that he will never be something Bond will not fear because he is too dangerous. To Bond, Q will forever be the most dangerous… the one he must rely on with things he doesn’t understand and likely never will.

Q knows too that there are things Bond once did not fear that he has learned to. He thinks maybe love is one of those things.

00Q00

“Do I scare you?” Q asks, just to make sure.

“Why would I be scared of you?” Bond asks back. “The man who has the luxury of wearing pajamas and drinking Earl Gray?”

 _Yes_ , is what he is saying. Q forces himself not to frown. “It is not a luxury so much as a basic human right,” he says. “You should try, sometime.”

Bond laughs, but it is forced. “Or what, will you tie me down and make me?”

“No,” Q says. “Though I wouldn’t be opposed to you tying me down.”

Bond’s eyes go dark with sudden arousal and they don’t talk much more for the rest of the night.

One day, Q thinks, he would like to be the one doing the tying. But this is an idle fantasy, because Bond fears being tied up, for reasons Q knows only by scars that he touches in the dead of night, tracing fingers down Bond’s side and along his inner thighs and even on those parts that Bond barely reacts to, though most men would. He wonders sometimes how much force it would take to make those scars.

00Q00

Q likes Tanner the most, maybe because Tanner never looks at him with fear in his eyes. Q doesn’t think Tanner fears much of anything and knows that the MI6’s psychologist only resisted labeling him apathetic because of Tanner’s intense loyalty for Queen and country.

He never would tell Bond that he likes Tanner most, though. He thought—back when this relationship was even newer and fresher and easier—that Bond wouldn’t be the jealous type. His penchant for married women that persists still seemed proof.

It is the opposite, Q has come to realize. Bond likes married women because he likes the idea of the ring, of the possession of someone so totally his, and because he hates the men who put those rings on and how they let those women slip so far from their grasps that they bed strangers who smile at them and hold out their hands.

The truth is Bond doesn’t like seeing Q with others.

Another truth, Q doesn’t like seeing Bond with others, but while Bond can command with the dip of his fingers against Q’s hips to leave himself for him alone… Q can’t command Bond.

Bond fears being commanded by someone he cares for. Those are the commands he finds it hard to break. This is why, Q thinks, he so resolutely tried to hate M, the old M, the M that died in his arms.

Only after her death has he allowed himself to love her as he always has. He doesn’t have to fear that love, the love of the deceased, nearly as much as he fears the love of the living. Q wonders if Bond will love him when he dies, inevitably, but then he is forced to realize that Bond will likely die first.

Q knows he will love Bond when he dies. He knows because he already does.

00Q00

Bond thrusts into Q with the force of a predator contained. Q tilts his head back, a calculated move to show off his neck, and Bond nips at his ear. Q knows better than to try and manipulate Bond—or at least Bond thinks.

“Please,” Q begs.

Bond growls and thrusts again, harder and harder until he is coming apart and undone and for a brief second uncontrolled.

The control returns and he jacks Q off with the finess of a longtime lover. Q comes, because he must, and lays there shaking as Bond rolls off him and grabs a washcloth to wipe the filth away.

Bond never sleeps in the same bed as Q. He will lie there for hours if Q asks him to stay, but he will not sleep and so Q no longer asks, because double-ohs need their sleep and M would yell if he knew.

Q has never been fond of being yelled at. He never yells. He speaks quietly and with authority and people listen. Not Bond, but then Bond is not people as much as he is his own self in the way that  _people_  never are.

00Q00

He breaks on the anniversary of M’s, old M’s, death. Not Bond, Q. He’d been wondering when he would, because though he has control he is not cut out for the long haul of holding in that which he knows he cannot have. In the past, Q has always found a way of retrieving what he could not have. His position at MI6 was one such thing.

He wonders sometimes if new M knows that, or if old M had never written it down for anyone to find.

On the anniversary of her death, Bond disappears. No one expects him to be around. No one is surprised when he doesn’t show up.

No one expects Q to disappear too, but then no one knows of his and Bond’s relationship. Not even M. They are both too good for that.

If M found out, Q wonders if he would let them ever see each other again. Not because of any form of homophobia or other such nonsense, but because they managed to hide it for a year. M fears that kind of power, even in the hands of his own men.

00Q00

Q finds Bond in Venice. Bond doesn’t seemed surprised when Q joins him on the dirty rooftop, but then Bond only shows his surprise when he wants the other to know. Q has learned that Bond shows any given emotion only when he wants the other to know.

“Her name was Vesper,” Bond says. “She was the only woman I couldn’t read and I loved her for it.”

“Do you still?” Q asks.

Bond says nothing for several long moments. Q is careful not to look at him, instead he keeps his eyes on the construction of a building next to where they sat. He wonders what had happened to it for them to have to rebuild from scratch.

“I don’t want to,” he says finally, and that is answer enough. He looks at Q then and Q looks back. “Have you ever been in love?”

The words Q speak become truths. This he accepts, and so he can’t help but say, “Yes,” because if he didn’t then he wouldn’t be able to reconcile the jump his heart takes every time Bond stares at him with those sharp blue eyes.

Bond watches him. “You don’t have a tell.”

Q wants to kiss him, but instead he turns away. “Maybe you’re just not looking hard enough.”

Bond moves closer and brushes a strand of Q’s unruly hair behind the frame of his glasses. It isn’t a move he has done before, on Q at least, and Q wonders what it means. “Maybe you’ll have to tell me.”

Q chokes on his own laugh and feels dangerously bold. He takes Bond’s hand from the side of his face to the juncture of his neck and chin. “Feel,” he says.

Bond does and then states dryly, “I hope your heartbeat is not usually so irregular. It would be a shame to lose my new quartermaster to heart failure.”

“Only for you,” Q says. “That is my tell.”

00Q00

Vanessa greets Q when he returns with a cup of Earl Gray and a smile. He feels that in a different life he would have been able to get caught in her green gaze, or maybe in Andrew’s dark skin and his quick fingers.

In this life, though, he is caught by a man who sits on a roof in Venice.

Eve comes up to him just as he is thinking of leaving. “I thought you were afraid of flying,” she says with a disgruntled frown.

“I am,” Q says. “It does not stop me from flying when I need to.” He could also tell her that he isn’t afraid, but he knows when a wiry quartermaster is needed and he knows when an attractive and competent female is needed. Both statements are true.

Because Q doesn’t fear the act of flying itself as much as he fears the possibility of falling.

00Q00

Q wakes to the feeling of another body curling up around his own. He knows it is Bond, because otherwise he would have awoken to one of the two dozen security measures he has around his apartment.

Bond says nothing, just holds him. Q falls back asleep.

When he wakes again, they have changed position and he is now lying on Bond’s chest. Bond’s eyes are closed, but that has never been an indicator of him sleeping. Still, when Q moves, Bond jerks and starts awake with a wild look in his eyes that says he is not used to falling asleep with others and Q’s heartbeat speeds up to levels greater than it had ever before.

Bond sees him and relaxes. He kisses Q on the lips, soft and without any real meaning behind it.

Q feels broken and put together and he wonders if that is what Bond also feels. He wonders if Bond ever self-reflects or if he just acts.

“Do I frighten you?” Q asks, because he needs something to break the moment, because if he doesn’t he will become too hopeful.

Bond does not hesitate. “Always.”

Q wants to cry. Instead, he lays his head back down on Bond’s chest and lets the touch of Bond’s hand on his shoulder sooth him. “Will you leave me?” he asks in a smaller voice.

Bond’s hand stops. Q raises his head again, because he thinks that he needs to see Bond when he answers. Bond meets his eyes. “The only mistress that will take me away from you is Death herself.”

“With Death, I can share you,” Q says, though he doesn’t want to.

“Okay,” Bond says. He kisses Q again, harder. Q kisses back, just as hard, and is surprised when Bond lets him. Bond laughs against his lips. “Okay,” he says again.

Q lets his control slip, so that Bond will be able to see all his love, and when Bond does the same he says, “I like you most,” though Bond may never know what he means. It is the truth now.

Bond holds him, doesn’t comment. He will, Q knows, on other things. It is his nature to reply to things that unsettle him with dry wit and they are still too new, even a year later, but Q will always have this to hold onto and he knows that, though he may have to share Bond with not just Death but with those that lie in her grasp already, he feels all at once inerrably alive.


End file.
